Tag Archive: pixy

Since coming home, we’ve all been busy unpacking, finding documents, getting documents, licenses, registering to vote, etc. During this busy time, whenever I start to feel a bit stressed, I am able to step out onto the back porch (if home), or look out the window while driving, at some of the most beautiful horizons I’ve ever known. It is a constant reminder of why we came back even as the temperatures quickly slide to near-freezing.

In particular, I’ve missed the sound of wind in the trees. How I love that sound; a song that brings the spirit of the woods to life. And while in Elk Rapids the other day, I went on a search for wind-chimes – something I’ve missed since selling our house and packing up our old set. After a number of stores failed to carry the larger style chime, I walked into a newer novelty store in town that looked hopeful. The woman who greeted me was new to the store and told me she hadn’t seen any chimes, but motioned over to a side door with a sign overhead that read, “Bargin Basement” and said, “You may find them down there.”

I thanked the clerk and began walking down the steep stairs. The basement was long and narrow and not terribly well-lit. I stood at the bottom of the stair surveying the numerous articles sent to the seasonal discount bins to wait out the long winters replaced by fluffy white sweaters with sparkly letters spelling out “Elk Rapids, MI.” The thought had just crossed my mind that I might not easily find a set of wind-chimes amongst so much stuff, when suddenly I heard the sound of chimes coming from one corner of the room.

As I walked toward the sound, I was startled to find a set of smaller chimes swinging wildly on their own. The clerk began walking down the stairs and I met her at the bottom, “Are you doing that?” I asked.

She saw the chimes swinging wildly. “No,” she answered and held her hands out around the swinging pendant to see whether unseen breezes might be at fault. “No wind,” she confirmed. We both stared dumfounded and assumed it must be some shift in the building or movement from the nearby street, but secretly I hoped for something more mysterious.

Today, as I sat wrapped up in a blanket beneath my new set of chimes with little wind to move the heavy pendant, I couldn’t help but move them just a little as I had just stopped the girls from doing moments earlier. As they made their music, I watched leaves flickering in the forest and and smelled the faint scent of cedar on the air mingling with the rich, earthy swamp smells. I pushed the pendant again.

As the sound flattened to inaudible tones, another sound took over. It began as a hushed low rumble and moved through the swamp in a swarm of leaf-flapping fury until it touched the pendant and spun it along each bold note so they sang in unison. I actually *giggled* with delight. What I pixy I’ve become returning to Michigan.